Another Cycling Mechanical Mystery Solved

Many years ago when I began riding to work in cold weather, I noticed that The Mule had developed an annoying ticking sound. The sound seemed to begin whenever I was pedaling hard. Did the bike have a bad ball bearing? Was some part of the bike too tightly or too loosely attached? Seeking the source of this annoyance, I checked my pedals and cranks and seat post and saddle and all sorts of things to no avail.

I let a couple of bike shop mechanics look the bike over. They were just as stumped as I was. One cold day as I was climbing up the final hill to the office I happened to look down and there was the culprit. My winter jacket had a draw cord around the waist. The ends of this cord had aglets, the little plastic thingies that go over the tips of shoelaces. When I pedaled hard, the ends of the draw cord would swing and the aglets would hit the top tube of my bike making that ticking sound.

The other day I came upon another mystery. I had The Mule on a workstand. The shifting on the rear cassette was sloppy. I had to constantly tweak the shifter to get the chain to settle on a cog. (One solution to this is to take the shifter out or index mode and revert to old fashioned friction shifting, but I digress.) The bike was angled down about 30 degrees so that I could fiddle with the dial adjuster that changes the tension on the shifter cable.

About two weeks ago, I had a Minimoto v-brake installed on my rear wheel. I was fed up with my old v-brake what simply would not stay in proper adjustment, causing one or both brake pads to rub on the rim of the rear wheel. Let me tell you, riding across Kansas with a rubbing brake as I did in 2019 and 2022 will ruin your whole week. When I picked the bike up at the bike shop, I spun the rear wheel. No rub! Finally.

So there I was tweaking the barrel adjuster on my gears when I noticed a sound from the rear wheel. It sure sounded like a rubbing brake pad. Sure enough, after only a week or so, my new, expensive rear brake was out of adjustment. Damn.

I was about to adjust the brakes when I decided to get the big rear saddle bag, a Caradice Nelson Longflap, out of my way. I took the bag off. Just before putting wrench to brake, I spun the rear wheel again. No rub!

I looked at the bag. I looked at the brake. Then it dawned on me. The wide, heavy bag was contacting the brake cable and causing it to actuate slightly which pushed one of the pads just barely onto the rim. Rather than adjust the brake, I swapped the Nelson Longflap with the smaller Carradice bag on Little Nellie. The smaller bag clears the brake cable. Problem solved. (Little Nellie’s smaller wheels mean its brake cable is much lower, allowing for plenty of clearance with the Longflap.)

I don’t use a big saddlebag on tours but I do put my tent and assorted other goodies on my rear rack. I suspect these may have been contacting the brake cable. In any case, the adjustment mechanism on the old brake was so beat up that I needed a new one anyway so I am not regretting the Minimoto purchase.

Sometimes it really is not about the bike.